The Millionaire's Misbehaving Mistress. Kimberly LangЧитать онлайн книгу.
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“I’m pretty beat myself,” Gwen said, a bit too brightly. “I think I’ll head on to bed. Thank yo—”
Will interrupted her, knowing full well he wasn’t going to let her retreat behind closed doors just yet. “There are a couple of things we still need to clear up.”
“Really? What do you…?” She trailed off as he closed the slight distance between them, and she took two small steps backward—only to find her back against the foyer wall. Her eyes flashed as he took advantage of her position and moved within inches of her body.
Reaching out, he captured the errant lock of hair that draped across her shoulder again. Twisting it around his finger, he played with the silky strand until her breathing became shallow.
“First, business and pleasure are two totally separate situations. I’m not one to confuse the two, and I’m surely not going to deny myself one just because I hired you to work. This—” he released her hair, only to move his hand to the elegant column of her neck, pleased to feel the pulse thumping wildly there “—has nothing to do with that.”
Gwen’s eyes widened as his other hand slid up her neck to cradle her jaw. She leaned in toward him, and he felt his own heartbeat accelerate.
“Secondly, Miss Behavior, I don’t give a damn about what’s appropriate.”
Kimberly Lang hid romance novels behind her textbooks in junior high, and even a Master’s programme in English couldn’t break her obsession with dashing heroes and happily ever after. A ballet dancer turned English teacher, Kimberly married an electrical engineer and turned her life into an ongoing episode of When Dilbert Met Frasier. She and her Darling Geek live in beautiful North Alabama with their one Amazing Child—who, unfortunately, shows an aptitude for sports.
Visit Kimberly at www.booksbykimberly.com for the latest news—and don’t forget to say hi while you’re there!
A recent title by the same author:
THE SECRET MISTRESS ARRANGEMENT
Dear Reader
Blame my very deep Southern roots, but I’m completely fascinated with etiquette. My obsession, however, extends beyond flatware and thank-you notes to very ‘out there’ information I’ll never have an actual need to use—like dinner seating protocol when both an ex-President and a member of the royal family are present. One day, when I was nose-first into an etiquette text, I found the inspiration for this book in a quote by the great Miss Manners, Judith Martin: ‘We are all born charming, fresh and spontaneous, and must be civilised before we are fit to participate in society.’
That quote sparked my imagination, and the dinner scene you’ll see in Chapter Two (the first night Gwen moves in) played through my head in full colour. The characters were so strong and interesting I knew I had to write their story. The more I got to know Will and Gwen (and Evie, too!), the more I adored them—and writing this book was so much fun.
I hope you enjoy getting to know Will and Gwen, and that you’ll drop me a note next time you visit my website (www.booksbykimberly.com). And, because there’s a little bit of Gwen in me, you know I’ll always write back!
All the best
Kimberly
THE MILLIONAIRE’S MISBEHAVING MISTRESS
BY
KIMBERLY LANG
For the women who made all this possible:
Andrea Laurence, Marilyn Puett, Kira Sinclair and Danniele Worsham—who are more than just my playfriends and the sisters-of-my-heart, they are also some of the smartest, most talented, and infinitely patient women I’ve ever been lucky enough to know;
Linda Winstead Jones, Linda Howard and Beverly Barton—who let me learn at the feet of the masters—I mean, mavens;
Pamela Hearon—who broke me of a lot of my bad habits in the nicest way possible;
and,
Bryony Green and Lucy Gilmour, whose editorial brilliance is matched only by their excellent taste.
CHAPTER ONE
“EVIE is Bradley Harrison’s daughter. I can’t just lock her in the attic and pretend she doesn’t exist!”
“You cannot continue to send her out in society as she is, either, William. She’s an embarrassment to the family and the company.”
Will Harrison poured another two fingers of Scotch and tipped the bottle in the direction of his late father’s oldest friend and HarCorp’s company attorney. So lunch at the Club yesterday hadn’t gone as expected. It wasn’t the end of the world.
Marcus Heatherton held out his glass for the refill. “Evangeline is a sweet girl, but Rachel let her run wild after your father died. You see the results. The child is a complete hoyden.”
Now there’s a word you don’t hear every day. Hoyden. Much nicer sounding than “ill-mannered,” “socially inept” or “tomboyish”—all of which had, unfortunately, been applied to his half sister.
The smile caused by Marcus’s word choice faded. The image of a petit four flying out of Evie’s wildly gesticulating hand and landing on the head of Mrs. Wellford’s spoiled lapdog like a little hat flashed through his mind. That had been funny. The ensuing regurgitation of said petit four in Mrs. Wellford’s lap after Shu-Shu swallowed it whole…well, that pretty much ended Evie’s most recent foray into Dallas society on a distinctly low note.
At seventy, Marcus possessed old-fashioned ideas about proper upbringing for young ladies, but old-fashioned or not, he was right. Fifteen-year-old Evie had no manners, no social protocol and, as Marcus had been reminding Will for the last half-hour, he had to do something about it.
Or else the Harrison name would be gossip column fodder once again.
When his father announced his engagement to a company secretary half his age, everyone but him easily pegged Rachel for the gold digger she was. Bradley, though, either couldn’t see or didn’t care, and he smiled benignly in the background as Rachel ran circles around him, spending his money like it was going out of style and making him the laughingstock of the very society she’d worked so hard to infiltrate.
When Rachel tired of Dallas, Bradley officially retired and moved her and five-year-old Evie to the Caribbean, leaving Will in charge of the family company at the ripe old age of twenty-six.
And while Will dedicated the next ten years to running the company and expanding it into an international force, his father and Rachel frolicked on the beaches around St. Kitts and traveled the world, but made no attempt to prepare Evie for her place in Dallas society—or civilization in general, as far as Marcus was concerned.
Will hadn’t heard much from Rachel in the last couple of years—after his father’s death, she’d been little more than another issue for the accountant to deal with—but after the accident last month that had left her daughter an orphan, he’d found himself Evie’s guardian.
So far, it hadn’t been easy. Yesterday had just been the proverbial last straw for Marcus.
Will cleared his throat. “Mrs. Gray and her tutors…”
“Mrs. Gray is a housekeeper. She’s kind to Evangeline and makes sure you both eat well and have clean clothes, but she is hardly the person to teach the child anything about etiquette. Evangeline’s tutors, even if they were qualified, need to focus on her studies so she’ll be ready to start at Parkline Academy in the fall.”